


Why he Believes

by bad_decisions



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Drugs, Gen, Mind Control
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-27
Updated: 2014-04-27
Packaged: 2018-01-20 23:23:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1529585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bad_decisions/pseuds/bad_decisions
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The story behind the photo on Kevin's desk</p>
            </blockquote>





	Why he Believes

They took a photo of him on his first day as the Voice of Desert Bluffs, to ‘commemorate’. He barely remembered the flash of the camera. He’d been having a relapse and they’d pumped him full of drugs to keep him docile.

When he looked at the photo later, framed and on his desk, he didn’t feel anything. If he’d still been able to, he probably would’ve felt... revulsion? Sadness, maybe.

There were the old scars on his forehead and cheeks, yes, but he was used to those. That wasn’t what made the man in the photo so terrifying, so pitiable.

He was smiling, apparently. The corners of his mouth were raised, anyway. He didn’t really think it counted as a smile. His lips were stretched too wide. There was nothing in his eyes. They were as cold and empty as the void itself. He looked more like a puppet than a man.

But really, wasn’t that what he was?

A ventriloquist’s dummy, voiceless unless they chose to allow him to speak, and repeating only the words that they spoke when they did. 

The photo sat on his desk at work, the dead grin reminding him always of his place. He was an empty, broken shell to be filled with their thoughts.

He hadn’t smiled for real in years.

Then StrexCorp came, and burned out the old Station Management, and gave Kevin medicine that filled the horrible, echoing spaces in his mind but left him a choice. Kevin chose StrexCorp, obviously. He broadcast StrexCorp’s propaganda like gospel truth, and helped its takeover. He laughed with joy as the town which had chained and suppressed his soul received the same treatment.

He smiled again, and it felt wonderful. He didn’t ever want to stop.

He kept the photo, as a reminder of where he’d been and where he must not go again. Fuel for the flames of revenge driven anger that kept him delightedly endorsing StrexCorp on air.

The town had grown to trust his words in the years they had not been his own, and so they trusted StrexCorp, and so they fell.

They became grinning, productive automatons, as Kevin had been once and would never be again.

He kept the photo on his desk to remind him why he believed in the Smiling God.


End file.
